A Snow Covered Nightmare: Refuge Series Book Two by Debbie Zello (12)

Chapter Twelve

Blain had gone back to his office with his team, still gloating over how well the first day had gone. He was just about to poke his head into the Chief States Attorney’s office, to give him a report, when his phone went off. “Hello,” he said, then listened. “Yes, this is Blain Kurtz. Who is this?” he answered, listening for the response. “That’s not possible, she was escorted home…Oh my God! Is she alive...Where...I’ll be there as soon as I can get there,” he said hanging up and running down the hall.

Aiden got in his car, and began to drive back to the courthouse, avoiding the area of the drive by. He didn’t want to be caught up in that traffic. He thought perhaps that was what happened to Briah. She was stuck in the aftermath of someone’s mess. But why wasn’t she answering her phone? By now, she would have checked it, he thought, worry niggling at his brain.

Briah arrived by ambulance at the hospital, unconscious. After her initial evaluation was completed, she was in a private room in the emergency area. She was guarded both inside the room and outside. There were also officers at every entrance of the hospital. They were in virtual lock-down.

Briah’s fingers on her left hand were badly burned from holding the barrel of the gun as it was repeatedly fired. She had numerous deep cuts and abrasions from the glass inside the car, some requiring stitches. Her worst injuries were the gigantic hematoma surrounding her abdomen, from the seatbelt, that might be indicative of internal injuries, and the whiplash and possible brain injury caused from slamming into the parked cars. A CAT-scan would determine if any of those maladies were present. Hers would be done shortly.

The Federal agents assigned to the tangential case of money laundering, etc., had arrived at the hospital before Blain. They were with Briah when she came out of her cataleptic state. She began moaning, as she stirred in the bed. Brice Coughlin, the lead agent, wanted badly to hold her hand, as a comfort to her, but after considering what had happened to her, he felt it might frighten her. He and the other men just stood there, helpless. “Miss Spencer, can you hear me?” he asked.

She continued her head movements and moaning.

“Miss Spencer, my name is Brice Coughlin. I’m one of the agents assigned to this case. We’ve never met, but I know Blain Kurtz and Aiden Baldwin.”

“Aiden. Where is Aiden?” she said groggy. She began to open her eyes slowly as if the sun was in them. She brought her right hand up to shield them. “Where am I? What happened?”

“You’re in the emergency room. You were brought here by ambulance from the accident. Do you remember what happened?”

“Yes, he tried to kill me. I snatched the gun and he shot it. A few times, I think. The windows broke. Then I don’t know what happened,” she said grimacing in pain.

“Call the nurse and get her something for pain,” he said to one of the other men in the room. “Who was it that shot at you?”

“Cody. No wait…he wasn’t Cody. He said Cody was called away. His name was Damian, I think. That’s right…Damian,” she said holding her head. She was becoming more alert as the minutes passed. Brice made a mental note of how small she looked in the bed. How fragile she looked.

“So you went with him without checking anything?”

“Yeah, stupid right? I got in the car with Cody this morning, without checking too,” she said mentally castigating herself for her stupidity. She was dealing with a mob-connected murderer. How could she be so stupid?

“Yes, but that was before he knew what you know. Now you have to adopt the theory that everyone is out to get you.”

“That sounds a lot like paranoia.”

“When someone is actually out to kill you, paranoia is just a good way of thinking,” Brice quoted a saying he had heard. He kept to himself that Cody was found dead in the trunk of the car she was riding in. He felt her knowing would just add to her discomfort. Sometimes the less said, the better.

“I already testified. What could killing me accomplish?”

“Your cross wasn’t finished and you may be needed for rebuttal at the end of the direct. Even during the eventual appeal, you might be needed. That is not as likely but still a possibility. Then there is just plain old revenge. You helped to put him away and he wants to return the favor by putting you away permanently.”

“Okay, so what do I do now?”

“We have you disappear. We keep you under watch 24-7 until the trial is over. Then you go into witness protection. You are given a new life in a new place. We manufacture everything for you, from a new birth certificate, to a new job. No one knows you, and you can’t be found because you don’t exist.”

“What about my job here? My life? My boyfriend?”

“If you stay here, it will just be a matter of time before he gets you. He’ll wait until you think it’s safe to come out of the hole you’re hiding in. You’ll go back to your life, and one day when you don’t see him coming…he’ll off you.”

“I can’t leave. I love Aiden and I won’t leave without him.”

“If you were married, he could go with you. It’s very expensive to manufacture an entire life for someone. The taxpayers don’t mind doing it for you, but I can’t ask them to pay for a boyfriend that might not go anywhere beyond boyfriend. What if you two get to where you’re going and break up? Do you see the dilemma I’m in?” he asked.

“Thanks for the offer. I’ll take my chances and stay right here. For the first time in a very long time, I have everything I want. I’m happy in my job, and I have a man I love with me. Why would I leave that?” she said focusing her eyes on him to make her point clear.

“How ‘bout to stay alive? We can’t protect you for the rest of your life. It doesn’t work that way, Briah. We would be pulled off the case soon after the verdict is rendered. Aiden can’t protect you every minute of every day. He has to work, shower, and sleep. This guy killed a man for sleeping with his wife. Do you actually think he’ll even swallow hard over killing you?”

She sat up in the bed, even though her head was swimming. She summoned all of her strength and said, “I’m not going. I love him and I’m staying right here! Do you feel me?” Brice nodded and left the room. There might be more than one way to skin this woman. On to plan B.

Blain and Aiden flew into the parking lot of the hospital at almost the exact same time. Aiden through open his door and was out of the car in one swift motion. He began screaming, “What the fuck happened, Blain? What the fuck went wrong?”

“I don’t know yet, Aiden. I haven’t spoken to anyone yet. You know as much as I do. I thought we had everything sewn up. I was wrong, I’m sorry,” he said sadly. The two men continued to run into the hospital as they spoke, showing their respective credentials as they passed the officers guarding the entrance.

“Don’t apologize to me, do it to her. That is, if she still speaks to you after this stunt.”

“I know I wouldn’t blame her if she didn’t. This was a royal screw up.”

They got to the emergency area and saw Brice and a few other men standing outside a room. Aiden walked to them and said, “Where is she?”

“They just took her for the CT scan. They said it would be an hour or so before she returns,” Brice informed him. “Can we talk somewhere?”

“Yeah, good, I have several questions for you,” Aiden said, following Brice into an empty room. Blain walked with them and the three men sat down in the visitor’s chairs. “What happened?”

“When she left for the day she had a bailiff escort her to the car just as she was supposed to do. The bailiff said there was a different guy there and Briah even questioned him. She accepted his answer, that the first guy was called away. We found him dead in the trunk after the accident.

“They drove off. Five minutes later the car plowed into a line of parked cars on the side of the road. Witnesses reported three shots just prior to the collision. One shattered the back windshield, one the side window and one went into the roof.”

“I don’t know how she managed to fend him off. His name is Damian Mitchell and he is a known hired assassin for the mob. He’s messed up pretty badly. When they got her out of the car, she was holding the barrel of the gun so tightly in her hand that they had to pry her fingers from it.”

“You don’t know her very well. None of this surprises me at all,” Aiden said.

“Me neither,” Blain agreed.

“I haven’t told her about the dead marshal. I figured she had enough with her injuries.”

“Where is this Damian guy?” Aiden asked.

“Somewhere in here under guard, shackled hands and feet, to a bed. He’s not going anywhere. I haven’t spoken to him yet.”

“I’d like a few minutes with him,” Aiden said.

“Me too,” Blain agreed.

“Not happening gentlemen. I need him and don’t want any problems with procedure. He won’t get away, that I will promise,” he said seriously. He turned toward Blain and said, “Would you excuse us please, Blain? I need to speak to Aiden alone.”

“Sure. I’ll wait in Briah’s room for her to come back,” Blain said, standing. He walked out the door, closing it behind him. Aiden turned from the door to face Brice again.

“What’s up?”

“I spoke to Briah about federal protection. I explained to her how it worked and what we could do for her. She refused it.”

“She say why?”

“Yeah, she did. She said she loves you and won’t leave.”

“She said she loves me? Or is that you saying she does?”

“No, man. She said those words herself. ‘I love Aiden, and I won’t leave without him.’ were her exact words.” Aiden sat back in his chair. If the whole thing weren’t such a mess, he probably would have smiled. He’d wanted to hear those words from her, for a long time now. Hearing Brice say them was still something.

“I love her, too. That’s the first time I have said that aloud. It surprises me to say it to you instead of her. Something I will rectify as soon as she is back in her room,” he said thoughtfully.

“That’s the damn problem, Aiden. She is staying because of you.”

“Why is that a problem?”

“They’re going to kill her…get it?”

“I can protect her. I’ll have her move in with me. We can ride to work together. I can do this!” he said losing his patience with the conversation.

“You, by yourself, go up against the mob? You and twenty guys couldn’t do it, but you believe you alone can? Think about this, Aiden. They got to her today in spite of Blain’s and your safeguards. They have time on their side.

“In a year or two, when you think enough time has gone by, and you can relax a little, maybe she is shopping with a friend for a wedding dress or at the salon getting a massage. Some guy walks in and pop, she’s gone. Just like that.”

“I’ll go with her then. I have skills that some little rinky-dink department might value. I can work anywhere,” he said thinking on the fly.

“Yeah, and they are so dumb that they’ll see her disappear with you. They’ll Google her and find nothing. Google you and see you’re working in East Bum-fuck and they put two-and-two together and find you, then her. You’ll lead them right to her, Aiden.”

“I’ll change my name too. You can do all kinds of things when you want to, Brice. When you love someone enough to.”

“That kind of disappearance cost hundreds of thousands to do. A new birth certificate, school records, medical, college records, work, landlord, credit, and tax returns. We set up social media that has posts that go back years so that everything looks like you have been around forever. We invent friends for Christ’s sake, that’s hundreds of hours of faking things. Do you get it? You can’t just wake up tomorrow and say aloud, ‘I don’t want to be Aiden Baldwin anymore. I think I’ll be Brad Pitt.’ It doesn’t work that way.”

“All right, so invent us together.”

“I’ll tell you what I told her. The taxpayers want something for their money. If they can get the head of the Denver mob put away with Briah’s testimony, they’ll be glad to help her disappear. Her boyfriend isn’t part of the deal. They’ll fork over the hundred thousand or so to save her life but yours…not so important. If they did this and you two break up, then what? They’re out the money and you’re on your way back here.”

“That won’t happen, and I won’t do that.”

“Said the last guy sitting where you are. I don’t make this shit up Aiden. This crap is real.”

“I love her, Brice. I mean through my heart and into my soul love her. I would die to save her. Take a bullet, if it meant she would live,” Aiden said closing his eyes.

“If that is so, then you have to go in there and tell her you don’t want her. You have to let her go. Make it ugly so she wants to leave. Make her hate you,” he said getting up. He walked to the door looking back at Aiden. His head was in his hands and his shoulders were shaking. Sympathetically, Brice shook his head and walked out.